


Catch Me

by renecdote



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Dick needs a hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-27 19:34:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13255170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renecdote/pseuds/renecdote
Summary: He hates these nights. When he’s stretched thin from chasing leads on three cases, when he’s trying to wrap things up as quickly as possible because he’s hyper conscious of what date is approaching, when a severe thunderstorm has driven him off the streets and back to the Manor.





	Catch Me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [haunt_the_stars](https://archiveofourown.org/users/haunt_the_stars/gifts).



> Written for the [Batfam Christmas Stocking](https://batfam-christmas-stocking.tumblr.com/) event on tumblr. This one if for [haunt-the-stars](http://haunt-the-stars.tumblr.com/)'s prompt "the batkids all have their own triggers". I'm really not sure I did this one justice, but I hope you enjoy it anyway :)

_ There’s a sound like a gunshot. No, not like, it is. Loud enough to make Dick flinch. He spins around wildly, searching shadows, but he doesn’t understand - there hadn’t been, there isn’t, a shooter. There’s only him and Damian and- and-  _

_ There’s a weight in his hand. One that is sickeningly familiar. He flexes his fingers and there’s a clattering. Metal on concrete. _

_ Gun on rooftop. _

\--  

For the longest time, it’s  _ that _ sound. The one that changed his life. The sickening thud of bodies hitting the ground after a fifty-foot fall. Catastrophically loud in the sudden, ringing silence of the tent. It’s the backing track to every nightmare for the first few years, jolting him awake with his heart in his throat and the smell of sawdust in the air. 

He guesses that old adage about time healing wounds is true though, because it gets better after a while. Not perfect. Not good. But better. Enough that it wasn’t  _ every _ time, just  _ most _ of the time, and now  _ some _ of the time. That doesn’t mean it goes away. It just… quiets.

And a new sound steps seamlessly in to take its place.

So these days, even though it’s not  _ that _ sound, it’s the other one. The one that makes his hands shake and his heart race and his stomach turn. The gunshot.  _ The. _ Not just any; the one that echoed in his ears for days. The one that is his fault. The one that killed Blockbuster.

\--

_ He can’t look down. Can’t make himself attach an image to the sounds he knows so well. Sounds he hears on the streets every night. Sounds like- _

_ A shout. Pained. Panicked. Dick turns back toward it, lunging forward on reflex. Because Damian is falling. Over the edge of the building and down down down down d o w n... _

\--

Nights like this, it all seems like too much. He hates these nights. When he’s stretched thin from chasing leads on three cases, when he’s trying to wrap things up as quickly as possible because he’s hyper conscious of what date is approaching, when a severe thunderstorm has driven him off the streets and back to the Manor. Unable to throw himself off a rooftop and disguise the anxiety, the crawling fear, with adrenaline.

The fact that almost everyone else in the family is here as well, called back to home base to wait out the storm, should make him happy. They’re all so rarely in the same place anymore, this should be an opportunity he can’t resist. Herd them all into the den, put on a movie, revel in the feeling of having Damian curled against one side and Tim on the other. Of Cass and Steph painting each other’s nails on the floor in front of him. Of Bruce trying not to doze off in an armchair and Alfred passing around hot drinks. 

Instead, he’s hiding out in a dark parlour. Alone.

\--

_ It’s like he’s watching the scene through strobe lights, everything moving too fast and too slow at once. One of Damian’s arms flails, grasping for something, anything, to stop his fall. Dick’s fingers brush against Robin's fluttering cape. So close, so close, he can almost-  _

_ His hand closes on air. _

_ Damian’s shocked, terrified, betrayed expression cuts him to the core. _

\--

It’s not the storm which is getting to him. Not really. It’s… everything. The thoughts, the memories, the close calls. Pressing down on him, closing in, squeezing until he’s curled in the corner gasping for air. 

The anniversary of his parents’ deaths is approaching. It kind of snuck up on him this year and the guilt of almost forgetting is mingling with the thousand other things that seem to have been going wrong lately. So it’s not the storm. But the storm sure as hell doesn’t help.

When the thunder crashes outside the window, Dick jumps. 

\--

_ “No!” Dick screams. He throws himself toward the edge, reaching for a grappling gun that isn’t there, and hits the concrete wall that hadn’t been there a second ago. He looks down desperately - maybe there was a fire escape, maybe someone else made it in time, maybe Damian- _

_ No.  _

_ No no no no nonononono. _

_ It’s not Damian. Red and green is replaced by black and grey. Batman. _

_ “Bruce,” Dick gasps. Sobs. Not Bruce, please, no, not another parent, no, I can’t lose him too. Please. No. _

\--

“Dick?” 

Dick spins around, finds Jason watching him from the doorway. His heart beats widely in his chest. He takes a breath to steady it, holds the air in his lungs until it starts to burn. 

“Jay,” he says, and his voice doesn’t tremble. “I thought you were still in the city.”

Jason shrugs. He shifts his weight like he’s going to step into the room, then shrinks back when there’s another crack of thunder and lightning flashes through the window. “Heating in my apartment isn’t working,” he says and Dick knows immediately that it’s - maybe not a lie, but an excuse. His brother has a dozen apartments; the heating in all of them can’t be broken. He’s here because…

The wind howls, smacking a branch against the window, and Jason and Dick both startle at the sound. They share uneasy smiles. Everyone is a bit more jumpy than usual tonight.

Jason has his own reasons for hating storms. Dick doesn’t know exactly what they are, but Jason’s dropped enough hints that he can guess. Things like glowing green water and muddy soil. The smell of damp asphalt and the static in the air. Probably some of the things that haunt Dick’s own nightmares as well. With their lifestyle, there’s bound to be overlap. He knows Tim at least has issues with falling as well. Damian wakes screaming with his father’s name on his lips. Cass sometimes catches sight of her reflection and flinches. Dick doesn’t like to think about what that means.

“You were looking for me?” he asks, forcing himself to stay in the moment. To not get sucked into the swirling mass of anxious thoughts that have been creeping up his spine all day.

Jason’s eyes flicker toward a shadow then back to him. “The brat was asking for you,” he says, glancing over his shoulder like he wants to be anywhere but the dark room Dick has found for himself. “We’re watching a movie. Nemo, I think.”

“Okay,” Dick says, dragging up a smile to throw over his shoulder as he turns back to the window. Nemo. Cartoon, funny, safe. “I’ll be there in just a moment.”

Jason hesitates for a long, agonising moment, but he doesn’t push it. Dick doesn’t have to say anything for his brother to get it. He sinks into an armchair as soon as Jason is gone, wraps trembling arms around his knees and tries to get his mind to shut up long enough to stop himself from spiralling.

\---

_ He turns around, away from the sight of his adoptive father falling. He can’t bear to watch it. Not again. _

_ But what he comes face-to-face with is so much worse. The roof isn’t the roof anymore, it’s the ground. A flat, dirty street. It could be anywhere in any city, but he knows it’s Gotham. Only Gotham could be this cruel. _

_ Dick falls to his knees among a sea bodies. Bruce and Damian and Tim and Jason and Cass and Babs and Wally and Kory and- Everyone. Too many to count. Too many to name. All of them broken and bloody, mangled from a fifty foot fall.  _

_ “No,” he moans, screwing his eyes shut. He gasps for air, finds he suddenly can’t breathe between sobs. “No, no, not all of them. Not  _ **_any_ ** _ of them. Please.” _

_ Please. _

_ No. _

\--

He shoots awake with a gasp. He hadn’t meant to fall asleep. Hadn’t  _ wanted _ to fall asleep. But he had, still in the parlour, still in that chair. He looks around wildly, finds green eyes peering at him through the dark. And some of the panic in Dick’s chest whooshes out in a relieved sob. 

Damian doesn’t say anything. He just stays crouched on the floor with his hand on Dick’s knee, still looking up at him with… It’s not sympathy. It’s something more haunted. Understanding. He doesn’t ask Dick what the dream was about, doesn’t tell him that talking about it will help. He just lets Dick pull him into a crushing hug, wraps skinny arms around his neck and holds on just as tightly. They all get nightmares. They all know what it’s like.  Most of the time Dick hates that, that his little brothers know even a tiny bit of the pain he’s felt. But right now he’s just glad for the comfort.


End file.
